Life after death? It may depend on how much you tweet, blog, post, or email

Life after death? It may depend on how much you tweet, blog, post, or email

If you find it creepy when a deceased person’s Facebook page continues to morph and expand even after they have passed away, life is about to get a whole lot creepier. Enter augmented eternity – a movement that has as its goal using artificial intelligence to convert a person’s digital footprint into a chatbot-like personality capable of answering questions, engaging in discourse, and otherwise impersonating the conversational style of an individual. Dr. Hossein Rahnama, of MIT Media Lab, is on a crusade to make this vision of the future a reality. Teaming up with researchers at Ryerson University, Rahnama describes his goal as bridging “the gap between life and death by eternalizing our digital identity.” As a person who’s lived to regret more than one Facebook post, the prospect of…